EzSEO Newsletter # 97
October 16, 2005 by Andy
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EzSEO Newsletter # 97
Andy Williams ez SEO
ez-search-engine-optimization.com
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This week:
1. Searching for Information – a really cool tool
2. Building Affiliate Sites – Miniseries Part IX
3. Guido Stiehle – The Jungle Marketer
4. Other Stuff
Hi again.
I found a great tool this week to help you research your niches. I created a small video showing how this tool is revolutionising my own niche research, and how it can help you with yours. Also we dissect a top sales page to see how the author has integrated answers to the questions we posed last week, into a lean, mean, pre-selling machine.
Finally, a f.ree resource you should all consider signing up to.
Let’s begin..
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1. Searching for Information – a really cool tool
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When you are building niche sites and trying to beat the “thin” affiliate trap, you need quality information to refer to as you craft your pages. Often we are trying to sell products we know nothing about, so any help here is gratefully received.
The internet has really helped people find information fast (and largely eliminated the need for homes to own encyclopedias), but with so much information around, it almost becomes like trying to find the proverbial needle in a haystack.
Imagine a piece of software that works like a computerized index of the internet. A piece of software that makes it easy to find videos, images, PDF files, tutorials, articles and just about anything else, on any topic.
You might be thinking, hey, your talking about Google, right?
Wrong. Google is just one of many sources.
I am talking about a piece of software that integrates all of the major internet authority resources into a single package, making finding what you want, a breeze.
Click here for a sneak preview of this tool.
This tool is useful for internet marketers, researchers, school kids looking for information to help with homework, doctors, the list is endless. I would go so far to say this software is essential to all Internet users. It would certainly not look out of place if it were built directly into Microsoft Windows (that of course would never happen, because MSN is only one resource in this tool).
I have put together a very quick video showing the basics of this tool, though I have only just scratched the surface. Maybe next week (if there is a demand), I will cover more aspect of Search Automator.
Watch the video I put together this morning (part way through this video, I click on a video link which opens in Windows Media Player. For some reason, the video image is not captured by Camtasia – the tool I use for video capture – and all you can hear is the sound, sorry).
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2. Building Affiliate Sites – Miniseries Part IX
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If you have been following this course so far, you will have:
a) identified your niche and checked for profitability
b) carried out your keyword research at Wordtracker.
c) sent yourself your keyword research from Wordtracker.
d) selected several phrases to use as main page keywords.
e) selected suitable phrases to be used for article pages.
f) learnt how to theme pages. You should use this information to begin collecting themed keywords for your planned pages.
g) seen how main pages differ from article pages, and understood how these differences dictate how the pages are created.
h) seen how selling differs from pre-selling, and learnt one way to sketch out a blueprint of your pre-selling content.
If you missed any of these newsletters, you can read them online at my blog:
http://ez-search-engine-optimization.com/blog/
This mini course begins in issue #89 and continues to the latest post in the blog.
I had intended to show you one of my own blueprints and how I turned it into a webpage, but time ran out this week, and I forgot to do my own homework ;o(
Instead, what I thought would be a useful exercise is to look at a successful sales page and see how it pre-sells the product.
Now not everyone uses my own methods of creating a sales page (by sales page, we refer to any page that is pre-selling a product), but most successful pages do have the same elements we talked about last week.
Here is the sales page I would like you to consider – open it now.
First, let’s remind ourselves of the questions from last week, so we can refer to them as we discuss this page.
Q1. What are the problems faced by your visitor that this product can solve?
Q2. Why have your visitors still got these problems? Let your visitors know that you understand their problems.
Q3. Describe what life can be like without the problems.
Q4. Introduce your product.
Q5. Feature list.
Q6. Final reminder of that “picture”.
Q7. Call to Action.
In the discussion that follows, we will use the question numbers above (e.g. Q4), to reference when these particular questions are being used in the pre-sell.
OK, let’s start.
The very top of the page has a highlighted question:
“Is your website stuck on page 10 in Google?”
Straight for the jugular (Q1). The problem is summarized with this one line. The reason people are this sales page is because they are having problems ranking well.
Anyone struggling with fr.ee search engine traffic is then tempted with the headline that seems too good to be true.
“Learn My Hidden Secret To Consistently Averaging Over 15,347 Visitors To My Websites Per Day – Using Only FREE Search Engine Traffic From Google, Yahoo, And MSN!”
This is exactly what the visitors want to learn about. Increasing traffic to their websites, and what a lot of traffic Brad gets! Who wouldn’t want that? (Q3)
NOTE: A word of warning here. Make sure the product lives up to the pre-sell. How many products have you bought that sound fantastic on the sales letter, but make your heart sink when you receive them? I bought one this week that did just that, and I asked for an immediate refund. I suppose the moral of the story is to only pre-sell products you believe in.
I know Brad Callen, and have seen the kinds of traffic he generates to his sites, so I know he is telling the truth here. However, Brad is aware that most people do not know him, and many may have never heard of him, so he instantly begins to work on the skeptical.
“Have all these ‘claims’ about getting more traffic triggered off your B.S. alarm? I don’t blame you….. ”
Brad provides proof of his claims (Q3) which anyone can check for themselves. He goes on in the next paragraph to paint a picture of what life is like without the problem of poor rankings – graphs showing his traffic (Q1 & Q3). He also provides over 400 AUDIO testimonials from happy customers. This all goes to help convince the visitor that the software is the real deal.
Brad follows his traffic stats with a simple question:
“Imagine what all this traffic could do for your sales!!”
Again, painting a picture that the visitor can actually see in their own minds eye (Q3).
The next section starting with the headline:
“What All That Extra Traffic Can Do For You…”
Makes it clear that Brad understands your problem (Q2) and reinforces that mental picture of life without ranking problems (Q1 & Q3).
This is reinforced again in the next section entitled:
“You’ll Be Able To Create Your Own Internet “Cash Machine” Allowing You To Achieve All The Goals You’ve Set And Enjoy The Freedom And Lifestyle You Want!”
Read the section. Doesn’t it make you re-evaluate your own traffic strategies and begin to believe that this guy knows what he is talking about? (Q1, Q2 & Q3).
Still no mention of his product yet (Q4).
Brad ends this section with:
“But it doesn’t have to be difficult, frustrating or confusing – the days of yanking your hair out trying to figure out how to get the RIGHT PEOPLE to come to your website or see your products are over”.
A clear reinforcement of Q3.
The next section entitled “How I Did It And More Importantly, How You Can Do It Too!”, introduces his software, and makes it clear that you can replicate his success using his software. The software holds the key to unlock the answers to your problems.
The next section entitled “You Mean You Actually Used Search Engine Optimization?” lets you know that you don’t need to be a nerd or post-graduate to be able to use the software – anyone can do it.
Brad has a box describing 4 reasons why you should be using SEO for your site. This box stands out so that those skimming the sales page (and there will be a lot), will see what his product is offering.
Then, bam, another headline to help solidify your mental image – “More Targeted Visitors = More Sales!” (Q3, or Q6 depending on how you look at it). The list of testimonials that follow, show that it is not Brad’s expertise that is getting him these results – his customers are enjoying great results too, with lots of #1 rankings for competitive phrases.
Brad then provides a call to action.
“Convinced? Then You Owe It To Yourself To Get My Software Immediately!”
The call to action is simple – Buy the software!
What follows is a list of features of the software. What the software can provide you in terms of information about your competitors. This is followed immediately by another call to action (again, but the software).
NOTE: It is often the case that people wont buy on the first visit to a site. What Brad is doing by having several calls to action as you move down the page is to try to combat this, by having repeated exposure to his buy link.
His calls to action are usually followed by answers to Q6. Painting that mental picture. The clearer the visitor can see the image in their head of what life can be like using his software, the more chance that visitor will become a customer. Testimonials help paint that picture, because they offer the views of those who have already bought and used the software.
Because the list of “features” can look daunting to SEO newbies, Brad alleviates those fears by stating that his accompanying manual will explain everything.
He also provides a sign-up link to his newsletter so that he can contact prospects in the future, and work more on turning them into a customer…
All this and we are not even half way through the sales page!
Knowing how people like to see things in action, Brad provides a set of videos showing how SEO Elite works. This is a great confidence booster, and again, helps fill in that mental picture of what life is like using this tool.
He takes some of the problems solved by SEO Elite, and shows you real world examples of how his software will solve those problems.
Just when you thought you had learned everything about SEO Elite, Brad hits you with more features.
To help show the visitor that he understands their problems (Q2), Brad includes a box entitled:
“Warning: Do NOT Buy Any Traffic Generating Solution Unless It Meets The Following 6 Criteria!”
These points reinforce the idea that SEO Elite really can solve the problems that other software does not (Q1 & Q2).
Brad is building up to the price. He wants his visitors to understand that although the software looks expensive, it really isn’t. He provides realistic figures on what SEO costs the average webmaster in terms of time and money.
Brad provides a short Bio of himself. A way to introduce his visitors to who he is (Q4). It build s confidence. He has a photo of himself, to show he is a real person.
For anyone still not convinced, Brad shows you his guarantee. This takes the risk out of buying. If you try it and don’t like it, he will give you your money back. What do you have to lose?
NOTE: A lot of people are still reluctant after reading a guarantee, because they just don’t believe the seller will honour the guarantee. All marketers with any reputation would not dare to renege on a guarantee. If they did, they know that they would get a lot of bad press in forums about their product, and this would cripple sales. Brad is well-known and well-respected in the SEO community.
Finally as you read down the page, you are confronted by this headline:
“Dare To Take The Ultimate Lazy Guy’s Way To Success?”
This is Q6 answered, just before his closing attempts to get you to buy.
He even uses this sentence:
“Can you visualize seeing your inbox jammed packed full of emails informing you of hundreds of signups and sales that YOU have made…with hardly any effort?!”
If that is not trying to paint a mental picture, what is?
The sales page then ends with more testimonials, and more calls to action (Q7).
This sales page is an interesting one. While I am sure Brad goes about crafting his sales page in a completely different way to myself, you can see all the elements we talked about last week.
This is an example of a great pre-selling page. It pre-sells the visitor into taking action, and his product definitely lives up to the pre-sell. I don’t know what Brad’s conversion rate is like for this page, but I would imagine it is quite high.
OK, now you may be thinking….
How can I use this information on my site trying to sell a zit cream I have never used?
Simple. Do some research (Search Automator mentioned above is now my tool of choice for that task), and see what others have to say about the product you are selling. Think about the problems faced by people with spots, and work on building a mental picture of life without spots.
The mental image really is the essence of a good pre-sell. This will be your secret weapon to convert visitors into customers, so don’t skip it. Don’t think it is too much trouble to create a page like this, because without this work, your visitors wont buy.
I often hear from my own SEO Website Builder customers that they make lots of m0ney from Adsense, but almost nothing from affiliate sales. Without exception, the pre-sell is what is letting them down. Visitors just aren’t interested in a load of content for contents sake, so take the easy option and click on the Adsense ads (that do an effective pre-sell in just one or two lines).
You can learn a lot about pre-selling by studying Adsense ads. After all, those who are paying for the ads will have fine-tuned what works, and what doesn’t.
Example: To see how Adwords customers can pre-sell in only one or two sentences, do a search on Google for Arelis review. Go down the results until you come to my review at the ez-search-engine-optimization.com site. Look on the right of that page in the Adsense ads displayed. Do you see how the Adwords customers are pre-selling? Even in one or two sentences, there are trying to paint a mental picture of life without the problems.
With a whole webpage to devote to your pre-selling, you should have a big advantage. Create your blueprint using the questions mentioned last week, and create your masterpiece.
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3. Guido Stiehle – The Jungle Marketer
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A long time ago, I recommended that you sign up for a newsletter run by Guido Stiehle. This is what I said about him:
“I recommend you sign up for Guido’s newsletter.
He is one of only a few marketers whose motive is to help others rather than shove every new product that comes out down your throat.”
You can see this testimonial on his homepage. So, why am I mentioning him again? Have I changed my mind?
Definitely not. Guido has been working hard to bring more fantastic (and fr.e.e) video tutorials to his readers. A while ago he released a set of tutorials for Wordtracker. I seem to also remember some videos on Adwords. Recently he brought out the fantastic Carp videos (a commercial product) which show how to include Amazon feed results in your pages using Carp (imagine having Amazon update your page with current, related bestsellers).
Anyway, to cut a long story short, Guido’s latest work in progress is a set of video tutorials on setting up and using WordPress. WordPress is a fre.e. script used for blogging (my own ezSEO blog uses WordPress). The tutorials are not finished yet, but he did send out the first draft to his subscribers this week asking for feedback so he could complete the series.
I asked Guido how much he was going to sell the videos for, and he told me that they he planned to give them to his subscribers for fr.ee. I think he is mad, but that is the sort of guy Guido is. If you are interested in learning how to setup and use WordPress, you really should sign up for Guido’s newsletter now, so that you don’t miss the opportunity. On top of that, you will get a quality newsletter from someone who is not afraid to tell it how it is, and genuinely wants you to succeed.
Guido Stiehle is The Jungle Marketer (and Jungle Dentist), and he produces a quality publication. It is one of only 3 or 4 that I actually read from start to finish. Sign up here.
BTW: Last time I mentioned his newsletter, I had a lot of people write to thank me for putting them onto such a good resource. How much more of a testimonial do you want than that?
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4. Other Stuff
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A new niche blueprint is due out this week.
I am very excited about the topic of this new one. If you want notification of its release, sign up for the notification list on the sales page above.
Well, that’s it for another issue. If you want to read the recent issues of this newsletter, you can read them online here at my blog:
http://ez-search-engine-optimization.com/blog/index.php
For older newsletters, you will need to visit the old archives.
Have a great week!
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